When using Windows auto-update, it seems to save the install files on my large external hard-drive, rather than my Windows c: drive. I'd rather not have all that stuff on my external drive - is there any way to force it to only use c: for windows update files?

1 Answer
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The windows update files are downloaded to your c drive, i.e. the same drive windows is installed. They should be in %systemdrive%\windows\SoftwareDistribution

What i think you mean is that you end up with folders like: X:\ee9bb670ca8d1b9684e57427c9bd30 on your external drive?

From what i understand, the behavior of most windows security updates is to extract themselves into a randomly generated folder, on a local disk drive with the most free space. Not sure if there's an easy way to fix this other then having more free space on your c drive then your external HDD.

Just a guess here, but if you can flag the drive as removable, maybe windows wont try to extract the files there?

That is my understanding of where the files are located and extracted too. I don't think it cares if the drive is removable as I've seen it use a large USB stick before now. I've never seen it use a network drive though, so it does have some filtering in what it consideres valid extract points.
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David SpillettNov 2 '09 at 9:35